Google's first Super Bowl ad gets buzz

Google's first Super Bowl ad got a lot of buzz before the game simply because Google doesn't much, if any, TV marketing.

And after the game, the $5 million ad is getting additional buzz for being rather refreshing next to all the guy-focused beer, car and chip ads. (How many mediocre Budweiser commercials do we really need during one football game?)

Google's ad took a simple and cutesie approach, showing the progression of a Parisian romance through a series of Google searches. Pre-game rumors predicted Google would showcase its new Nexus One phone or another newish technology. But it stuck with its staple search product instead.

More than any other tech company, Google is enamored with its users' stories and how its products "make a difference" in people's lives. So I wasn't especially surprised they took that approach, especially a week before Valentine's Day.

CNET's Caroline McCarthy points out that this could be seen as unoriginal, but also thinks it was a good marketing move to air an ad that would be appealing to female viewers after a litany of chauvinistic frat-boy ads.

I agree. It was certainly better than the GoDaddy.com ads that both ended with the female shirt-unbuttoning that you've come to expect from Super Bowl ads.

The other two tech company ads that caught my eye during the game were for Vizio and Intel.

Vizio picked up on one of the major pushes we'll see from the TV industry this year--providing access to Internet applications. Vizio, the TV manufacturer that built its reputation for reasonably-priced flat-panel TVs a few years ago, showed customers' ability to use the TV set as a portal to Facebook, Twitter, Flickr and Netflix.

Then there's Intel. It paid CBS nearly $4 million to air two commercials and to sponsor the post-game show. Its commercials touted its new Core processors in ways I thought were endearing. The commercial I liked the best showed an engineer in the company cafeteria gushing over the new processors as "the greatest thing" the company had ever created, hurting the feelings of an emotionally sensitive Intel-created robot nearby.

As Computerworld reports, Intel monitored the social media reactions to the ads via Facebook, Twitter and YouTube.